Measure factory

ABSTRACT

A measure factory for generating analytic measures includes data sets representing business activities arranged as columnar arrays with each column being associated with a distinct source rule that applies to the column when it is used as a data source. The measure factory includes factory rules that govern which operations on available data sources may be executed under what conditions in the measure factory, such as by taking into account the source rules and other applicable factory rules. A factory rule execution hierarchy governs the execution of ready factory rules that lack dependency on other factory rules before executing ready factory rules that have dependency on other factory rules. A script generation facility generates a script to process the plurality of factory rules according to the factory rule execution hierarchy.

CLAIM TO PRIORITY

This application is a continuation of [DMSL-0004-U01] U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 15/445,692, filed Feb. 28, 2017.

U.S. patent application Ser. No. 15/445,692 claims the benefit of U.S.Provisional Patent Application No. 62/301,136, filed Feb. 29, 2016,titled TECHNIQUES FOR GENERATING BUSINESS WORKFLOW-SPECIFIC DATA SETS BYAPPLYING BUSINESS RULES TO DISTINCT COLUMNAR DATA SETS, the entirety ofwhich is incorporated herein by reference.

U.S. patent application Ser. No. 15/445,692 is a continuation-in-part of[DMSL-0002-U01] U.S. patent application Ser. No. 15/164,546, filed May25, 2016 that claims the benefit of [DMSL-0002-P01] U.S. ProvisionalPatent Application No. 62/168,339 filed May 29, 2015. U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 15/164,546 is a continuation-in-part of[DMSL-0001-U01-0O2] U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/954,795, filedNov. 30, 2015, which is a continuation of [DMSL-0001-U01] U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 13/907,274, filed May 31, 2013, issued as U.S. Pat.No. 9,274,668 on Mar. 1, 2016, which claims the benefit of[DMSL-0001-P01] U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/655,847,filed on Jun. 5, 2012, and [DMSL-0001-P02] U.S. Provisional PatentApplication No. 61/789,527, filed on Mar. 15, 2013. Each of theforegoing applications is incorporated herein by reference in itsentirety.

BACKGROUND

Facilities for providing assessment, feedback, and determining a sourceof substantive changes in business performance often require a highdegree of sophistication by a business analyst and programmers togenerate performance measurement and analysis that meet the need ofindividuals within diverse organizations. The bulk of the work requiredis rarely substantively transferrable to other use requirements andtherefore presents an ongoing burden to organizations, and the like.

SUMMARY

A measure factory for generating analytic measures may include data setsrepresenting business activities. The data sets may be arranged ascolumnar arrays with each column being associated with a distinct sourcerule that applies to the column when it is used as a data source. Themeasure factory may include factory rules that govern which operationson available data sources may be executed under what conditions in themeasure factory, such as by taking into account the source rules andother applicable factory rules. The measure factory may use a factoryrule execution hierarchy that executes ready factory rules that lackdependency on other factory rules before executing ready factory rulesthat have dependency on other factory rules. The measure factory mayalso include a script generation facility that generates a script toprocess the plurality of factory rules according to the factory ruleexecution hierarchy. A script processing facility of the measure factorymay apply the generated scripts to the plurality of data sets.

The measure factory executes scripts independent of an order in whichfactory rules are presented to it. Therefore, the order of execution ofscripts resulting from the script generation facility is independent ofan order in which the factory rules are detected. As a result, themeasure factory removes a need for any understanding by the user of therequired order of execution when casting data sets, source rules, and/orfactory rules.

As noted above, only ready factory rules are executed. A factory rulemay be determined to be ready when data that the factory rule requiresis available in one or more of the plurality of data sets. This basicdependency on availability of required data for executing a factory ruleprovides structure for determining an order of execution of factoryrules. As an example of ready factory rules, data is treated asavailable when the factory rule uses only source rules or when it isgenerated by another factory rule the processing of which is completefor the data that the factory rule requires.

The hierarchy of measure factory execution indicates that a ready calcfactory rule is applied before other factory rules. Likewise, a readyflag rule is applied after all ready calc rules have been applied to agiven data set. In this way, the hierarchy of factory rule executionindicates an order of factory rule execution. As a further clarificationof the execution hierarchy, the order of factory rule execution requiresready calc, flag, and lookup rules to execute before ready link ruleswhich execute before ready plugin rules.

The script generation facility of the measure factory may generate ascript based on a data graph derived from references to the data sets inthe factory rules. Specifically, the script generation facility maygenerate the data graph as a step in a process to create the script.Also, the script generation facility may select among a plurality offactory rules based on an effectivity date associated with each of theplurality of factory rules and a script target date. The script targetdate may be the date on which the script is generated. Alternatively,the script target date may be an effectivity date of the script.

Methods and systems of a measure factory may include automatedmeasurement of business performance through a combination of configuringa plurality of business performance measure factory rules asrelationships of data source rules and of other factory rules; arranginga plurality of data sets with data representing business activities ascolumnar arrays wherein each column is associated with a distinct sourcerule; generating a script for processing the plurality of data sets fromthe factory rules based on a factory rule execution hierarchy thatexecutes ready factory rules that lack dependency on other factory rulesbefore executing ready factory rules that have dependency on otherfactory rules; and processing the plurality of data sets with thegenerated scripts to produce a business measure.

Other methods and systems described herein may include managing abusiness operation through insight into the operation generated bydefining measures of data, such as data for operating the business, thatcharacterize the operation at a level of abstraction that is independentof a source and/or location of data (or presence thereof) in the datathat characterizes the operation. Optionally, references to data in themeasures map to types of data and/or rules of the data that characterizethe operation.

In another aspect of the measure factory methods and systems describedherein, a measure factory output dashboard may be automaticallyconfigured based on factory rule definitions and an indication of atleast one dimension of data that the factory rule impacts. The automaticconfiguration may cause arranging measures on the dashboard to visuallyalign with the at least one dimension. The output dashboard may beautomatically re-configured to display measures that, upon processing ofa set of measure factory rules according to an execution hierarchy,correspond to a pattern of interest defined by an operator of themeasure factory. In some cases, the pattern of interest is defined bydeparture of a measure from a historical range for the measure.

In another aspect of the measure factory methods and systems describedherein, a measure factory user interface that facilitates defining ameasure factory may include defining data set source rules thatassociate data within a plurality of columnar data sets, factory rulesthat govern at least one of extraction, transformation, computation, andloading of data within and among the plurality of data sets,user-selectable dimensions within the data set around which a userinterface for viewing an output of the measure factory is arranged, andmeasures that are presented in the user interface.

Methods and systems for new and novel applications of a measure factorymay include automated detection of difference of business-specificperformance measures via automated computation of measures by applyingsource rules and factory rules to business-specific data. Thedifferences may be automatically detected by comparing measures tonormalized measures of the same type to identify departures from normal.The normalized measures may be established based on historical averages.They may also be established based on past time periods.

Other applications of a measure factory may include automated detectionof at least one variance-impacting dimension of a plurality ofdimensions of data that contribute to a measure of business performanceof business activities that are represented at least in part by thedata. In this application, detection may include: determining data thatcontributes to the measure of business activity; comparing differencesbetween at least one of summaries of the determined data and elements ofthe determined data for a plurality of varying measures, the variancesmay be variation in measure time-periods; ranking at least a pluralityof the differences from largest to smallest of the plurality of thedifferences; and presenting descriptive data for the top rankeddifferences to a user in an electronic user interface of a computer. Theuser interface may facilitate selecting the plurality of varyingmeasures, such as by selecting timer periods.

Yet other applications of measure factory methods and systems mayinclude automatically ranking by degree of impact, business activitiesthat impact a change in business performance detectable from acomparison of a plurality of distinct time period-specific measures ofbusiness performance, the measures generated by processing datarepresenting the business activities for the plurality of time periods,such as with a measure factory. Processing with a measure factory mayinclude applying data processing scripts to data representing thebusiness activities. The scripts may automatically be generated from oneor more combinations of: a plurality of factory rules described asrelationships of source rules and relationships of other factory rules;a plurality of data sets comprised of data representing the businessactivities arranged as a columnar array wherein each column isassociated with a distinct source rule; and a factory rule executionhierarchy that indicates ready factory rules without dependency on otherfactory rules are executed before ready factory rules with dependency onother factory rules.

In any of the measure factory methods and systems described herein,factory rules that apply only to data within a specific data set may beexecuted independently of factory rules that apply to data within otherdata sets.

Another application of measure factory methods and systems may includeprojecting a difference of a business performance measure based onanalysis of differences over time of data elements that, when processedthrough a measure factory, produce measures of the business performance.

Still another application of measure factory methods and systems mayinclude suggesting a business activity as a source of a variance betweentwo business-centric performance measures of a business, the measuresgenerated by processing data representing activities of the businesswith a measure factory.

Suggesting an event that is characterized by data within a data set as asource of a variance between two business-centric performance measuresof a business is an additional application of the measure factorymethods and systems described herein. The measures may be generated byprocessing data representing activities of the business with a measurefactory.

Automated variance detecting applications of a measure factory mayinclude a business operational dashboard that automatically presentscontributors to notable variances of a measure of business-performanceover time. The contributors may be determined from sources of measuresas defined by a set of factory rules of a measure factory. Thecontributors may further be tagged with a variance-impact confidencefactor. Additionally, the dashboard may be automatically configuredbased on a determined role of a user of the dashboard. The contributorsmay be further filtered based on the determined role of the user so thatsources of data for contributors associated with the determined role ofthe user are represented in the dashboard by descriptive informationabout role-specific business activities that correspond to the sourcesof data for the filtered contributors.

These and other systems, methods, objects, features, and advantages ofthe present disclosure will be apparent to those skilled in the art fromthe following detailed description of the preferred embodiment and thedrawings.

All documents mentioned herein are hereby incorporated in their entiretyby reference. References to items in the singular should be understoodto include items in the plural, and vice versa, unless explicitly statedotherwise or clear from the text. Grammatical conjunctions are intendedto express all disjunctive and conjunctive combinations of conjoinedclauses, sentences, words, and the like, unless otherwise stated orclear from the context.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

The disclosure and the following detailed description of certainembodiments thereof may be understood by reference to the followingfigures:

FIG. 1 depicts a diagram of elements of a measure factory.

FIG. 2 depicts a diagram of data sets and rules of a measure factory.

FIG. 3 depicts a calculation factory rule.

FIG. 4 depicts a lookup factory rule.

FIG. 5 depicts a flag factory rule.

FIG. 6 depicts a link factory rule.

FIG. 7 depicts a plugin for use with a measure factory.

FIG. 8 depicts measure factory data set rule processing.

FIG. 9 depicts a flow chart of processing ready rules.

FIG. 10 depicts a measure factory embodiment for generating a chargescBase and an Accounts cBase.

FIG. 11 depicts a table that represents a charges data set.

FIG. 12 depicts a table that represents an account data set.

FIG. 13 depicts a table that represents data used by a lookup factoryrule.

FIG. 14 depicts a table that represents a data set used by a flagfactory rule.

FIG. 15 depicts a table that represents measure configuration anddescription information.

FIG. 16 depicts a measure factory executive dashboard.

FIG. 17 depicts a dashboard in a user interface of a measure factory formeasures based on recent time periods.

FIG. 18 depicts a table of measures in a measure factory user interface.

FIG. 19 depicts a multi-view dashboard in a measure factory userinterface.

FIG. 20 depicts an application of a measure factory for automatedanalysis.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Referring to FIG. 1, an embodiment of a measure factory, data sets,rules, measures and views are depicted. In embodiments, a data set 102may be a collection of records, each of which may describe a particularkind of object, event, or relationship. Typically, data sets includedata that represent some aspect of a business or business process. As anexample, an “Accounts” data set may have records for individual accountsof a business (e.g., an account maybe associated with a customer orpatient of the business); there may be one record for each such account.

Records in a data set may have a number of facts, or individual piecesof information, associated with them. Individual records may havecertain kinds of facts that are unique to the record (e.g., a recordidentifier). However, other kinds of facts may be common to some or allof the records in the data set. For simplicity, each common type of factis referred to herein as a source rule 104 of the data set. Generally,each source rule 104 is common to all records in a data set 102. As anexample, the Accounts data set may have rules such as “Account ID”,“Admit Date”, “Purchase Date”, and the like. The “Admit Date” rule mayindicate an admission date type of fact for each record.

Goals of the measure factory methods and systems described hereinincludes adding new rules (new types of facts) to a collection of datasets, and making it easier to create and manage a large number of rules.The measure factory methods and systems described herein may automatethe definition, generation, and processing of the rules, so the peopleworking with the business data can focus on the correctness of the rulesfor generating meaningful measures, independent of the implementation ofthose rules, such as in terms of the requirements for preparing data foreach rule and the flow of data from source data sets to final data sets.

One structural output of applying the measure factory methods andsystems described herein may be a set of data structures, e.g. enhancedand newly created data tables 108 that support business-centric uses ofthe data. One such use may be an interactive electronic user interfaceor dashboard 110 for operating a portion of a business associated withthe data in the data sets 102. As an example, data output by a measurefactory may be displayed in summary form, such as depicting a number ofAccounts with Admit Dates occurring this month. The summary form may bea single number, such as 286. The measure factory methods and systemsdescribed herein may summarize data in many ways. Each such way ofsummarizing data may be called a “measure” 112. A measure is typicallythe result of applying some mathematical expression to a specific set ofrule values from a collection of records in one or more data sets.

Referring to FIG. 2 that depicts a diagram of data sets and rules of ameasure factory, data sets 102 may be arranged as subsets of records.Subsets may be dynamically configured based on relationships of data inthe records for specific rules. As an example, subset 202 comprising thefirst and third rows in the example embodiment of FIG. 2 may define datafor rule X and rule Y that meet certain criteria, such as a non-zerovalue, a value relative to a threshold (e.g. above or below a thresholdvalue) or relative to a set of thresholds (e.g. within or outside arange). A measure may result in a set of records from a data set, suchas subset 202 being processed by a factory rule to produce a result,such as a summary, mathematical outcome, logical outcome and the like.In the example of FIG. 2, the measure 204 sums the values of records insubset 202 defined by rule x and divides that sum by the sum of valuesof records in subset 202 defined by rule y.

Measures may have associated data which helps to support rich displays,such as a description, a flag indicating whether the measures are“better” when it goes up or down relative to a prior time period orother measure, a set of preferred columns to access when analyzing themeasure, and the like.

Measures may also be associated with a “view”, which is an abstractionover the rules available in a data set. A view may assign specific rulesto abstract rule concepts, to further separate a fact type from acorresponding rule. For instance, the abstract concept of “Date” may bespecifically assigned to “Admit Date” for the “Admissions” measure, butit may be assigned to “Discharge Date” for the “Discharges” measure.This allows the dashboard to show the Admissions and Discharges measurestogether over a general time range (such as year-to-date), even thoughthe two measures have a different concrete notion of which date rule isrelevant to them.

More specifically, a view may be an abstraction of rules independent ofwhat the underlying rule represents, e.g., different types of “date” canall be abstracted to a “date” view-level rule type. This way “admitdate” and “discharge date” can both be treated as a “date” in aview-level “date” rule. As an example, a measure of admissions canreference a date value in admissions data set records. The date in theserecords would be an admission date. Similarly, a measure of dischargesthat accessed a data set of discharge records would reference the datein each record that would be a date of discharge. This is a simpleabstraction example, but generally all rules to be abstracted to aview-level rule should be of the same general type (e.g., a date, afacility, a procedure or the like).

The measure factory methods and systems described herein may includedifferent types of rules, such as source rules, factory rules, and thelike. Exemplary types of rules are described in the following paragraphsand corresponding figures.

A first type of rule may be a source rule. Source rules may beassociated with types or dimensions of data in a measure factory dataset. As an example, a data set may be configured by extracting data fromone or more external data stores, such as data stores, databases, datastreams, and the like that may be associated with an aspect of abusiness for which the measure factory may be configured to analyze. Ameasure factory data set may preferably be configured as a columnardatabase (herein referred to as a cBase). The columns in such a cBasemay be automatically made available as source rules in the data set. Assource cBase data sets are processed by the measure factory, other typesof rules (e.g., additional columns) may be added. Although not intendedto be limiting, processing of one or more data sets by the measurefactory may be referred to herein as a “factory build”.

In addition to source rules, there are several types of factory rulesthat may be referenced during the generation of a measure factoryprocessing deployment. Such factory rules may be used to define measuresby a person or may be automatically configured into a set of cohesivedata processing measure factory data processing operations.

FIG. 3 depicts a first type of factory rule, specifically a calculationrule (herein referred to as a “calc” rule). A calc rule may generate newdata that may be added to one or more of the records in a data set byapplying one more mathematical expressions to data associated withexisting rules in a data set. The use of a calc rule example of FIG. 3defines a factory rule referred to as “Admission”. This factory rule maybe defined by a user as value(“Patient Type”)=“Inpatient” andvalue(“Admit Date”)!=null. This could be interpreted as assigning avalue to a new rule “InPatient” for each processed record (e.g., addingthis new rule as a new column to a cBase data set, such as an Admissionsdata set). A script that could automatically be generated by the measurefactory based on the factory rule definition above may simply be:calc-rule “Admission” ‘value(“Patient Type”)=“Inpatient” andvalue(“Admit Date”)!=null’. The result of such a rule may cause eachprocessed record that has a non-null Admit Date value to be classifiableas an Inpatient record. The value “Inpatient” could be a binary value(e.g., 1 or 0, or may be a more involved value, such as a text string,formula, or the like).

FIG. 4 depicts another type of factory rule that may perform datalookups for assigning one or more data values associated with one ormore source rules into a group. A lookup rule may get information from alookup file and may match certain values from certain rules in eachprocessed record with values in the lookup table. The lookup table maybe configured with a set of rows that include a lookup code that may bematched to the value of each processed data set record and a descriptionvalue that may be added to each processed record in a new columnassociated with the rule for which the lookup is performed.

An exemplary use of a lookup rule is to convert codes into textdescriptions. In the lookup factory rule example of FIG. 4, the lookuprule converts “Revenue Code” (depicted as “Rule X”) to “RevenueDescription” (depicted as “Lookup Rule”). A lookup file, would beaccessed and the “Revenue Code” rule value in each processed cBaserecord would be used as an index into the lookup file. A corresponding“Revenue Description” value in the lookup file would be placed in a“Revenue Description” column of the processed record. An automaticallygenerated script to define such a rule might comprise: lookup “RevenueDescriptions” {date rule=“Posting Date”; key “Revenue Code”; lookup-rule“Revenue Description”}

In some cases, a lookup rule could be implemented as a calc rule, butlookups have advantages over plain calc rules. Lookups are easier tomaintain. As an example of easier maintenance, one can modify the lookupvalues by editing the lookup table directory, and the lookup table canbe generated by an external process. Lookup rules can also access an“effective date range” for each entry in the lookup table. Therefore, ifa preferred mapping between an index and a description in the lookuptable changes over time, the effective date range values in a lookuptale entry can reflect that change and return the mapped valueappropriate to the time associated with the record. In an example, ifRevenue Code 123 meant “Emergency Room—Other” for transactions thatoccurred before Jan. 1, 2015, but it meant “Urgent Care” fortransactions on or after that date, then the lookup table can be set upto facilitate accessing the appropriate Revenue Code 123 for eachexecution of the measure factory. The effective date range may bematched to a target date range for the execution of the measure factory.In this way, the data added to the cBase column for each processedrecord may correspond to a preferred effective date. Further in thisexample, a target date may be predefined, may be calculated by a factoryrule, may be referenced in the processed record, and the like.

Referring to FIG. 5, another factory rule is depicted for flaggingcertain records in the cBase based on values in the record. Whereas alookup rule can result in any string or other value being loaded to acBase column in each processed record in a data set based on othervalues in the record, a flag rule results in one of two values beingadded to the cBase record. This rule is generally useful for mappingrecords, based on a select rule value (e.g., Revenue code) as eitherincluded or excluded from a particular set of records. In the example ofFIG. 5, records with revenue code 110 are not included in an ICU chargegroup of records, whereas records with revenue code 200 are included.Additional entries in the flag table could allocate records with otherrevenue codes to be included or excluded from the ICU charge group. Inthis way, further processing can be based on whether the record is anICU charge (included in the ICU charge group) or not (excluded from theICU charge group).

An automatically generated script for processing records with the flagrule of FIG. 5 may comprise: flag-table “Revenue Flags” {daterule=“Posting Date”; key rule=“Revenue Code”; flag-rule “ICU Charge”}.When this script executes, Revenue Codes in processed records will bematched to the Revenue Flags file entries. Where there are matches, ifthe record value Posting Date is within the effective dates for thematched Revenue Flags file entry, a new value (e.g., true/false) will beadded to the “ICU Charge” cBase column in the processed record.

Referring to FIG. 6, a factory rule for linking data among data sets isdepicted. A link rule may also be used to move or duplicate data fromone data set to another. A link rule may use a “key”, which may be arule in an origin data set that is used to match data records for thecorresponding rule in another data set herein called a matching dataset. The link rule may facilitate connecting or associating records fromthe two data sets which share the same value for the selected key. As anexample of a link rule key, both an Accounts (origin) and a Charges(matching) data set may have an “Account ID” rule in them. Data in thetwo data sets for records that have the same value in the “Account ID”rule (or column in a columnar data set) may be used in an operationassociated with the link rule. The operation associated with the linkrule, may include a summarizing mathematical expression that may beapplied to the records in matching data set. The result of theexpression may be placed in the corresponding record(s) in the origindata set. In the example of FIG. 6, an origin data set 602 includes arule X that is used as a key for a link rule. A record in the origindata set 602 has a value of X2 for the key. This value X2 is used tofind records in the matching data set 604 that have the same key value.An expression associated with the link rule causes other values in thematching records, such as by reciting an operation to perform onspecific rules (e.g., Rule Y in FIG. 6) in the matching data set. Theoperation is performed on all records in the matching set that containthe key value. In the example of FIG. 6, the values in Rule Y of eachcorresponding record in the matching data set are summed. The result isloaded into a new link rule column in the appropriate record in theorigin data set. In the example of FIG. 6, records in an Accounts dataset will be updated with a total of charges found in the Charges dataset for records in the Charge data set that match the Account ID of eachrecord in the Accounts data set. This results in each Accounts recordnow including a total of charges for the account. While a summingexpression is used in the example of FIG. 6, any logical, mathematical,or other expression may be used.

A script that may be automatically generated and executed by the measurefactory for the link rule example of FIG. 6 may be: link “Charges” {key“Account ID”; link-rule “Has ICU Charge” ‘count( )>0’ filter=‘value(“ICUCharge”)’}. In this example, a default operation performed by the linkrule is a mathematical summation of the ICU charges for each Account IDfound in the Accounts data set.

Through the automated processing of factory rule definitions asdescribed later herein, multiple-dependencies among data sets may besafely ignored by the user. The measure factory determines which rules(e.g., operations) must be performed to satisfy any cross-data setdependencies.

FIG. 7 depicts another type of factory rule that provides a rich dataprocessing capability to a user without overly complicating the measurefactory, specifically a plugin rule. As an example, a plugin rule isavailable to produce rules that are not possible using the other ruletypes. A plugin rule may execute an external process to determine therule values, deliver data based on those values to the external processthat performs operations with the delivered data from the data sets, andthen join the result of that external process back into the data set(s).This allows the user to inject more complicated logic into the factorywhile still taking advantage of the measure factory's automaticmanagement of the data flow.

As an example of a plugin rule, computing whether an Admission is a“Readmission” may need to determine if the current Admission encounteroccurred within a certain number of days after a previous encounter ofthe same patient. This requires looking at data outside of eachindividual account record (e.g., prior account encounter records). Aplugin rule can be defined to handle readmission calculations.

A readmission plugin rule may be configured by a user and the measurefactory may automatically generate the following script for it: plugin“Readmission” {input “Accounts” {column “Account ID”; column“Admission”; column “Admit Date”; column “Discharge Date”; column “DRG”;column “MRN”}dimension “Account ID”; plugin-rule “Readmission”}

A feature of a measure factory is its ability to automatically managethe application of rules, so that a user configuring the factory canfocus on defining factory rules. The methods and systems of a measurefactory free the user from needing to track when data that may be neededfor a factory rule is ready for use. The measure factory isolates theuser activity of defining rules from their processing.

A measure factory may process data using a “swim lane” method,embodiments of which are described in U.S. provisional patentapplication Ser. No. 62/301,136, the entirety of which is incorporatedherein by reference. Each data set may be built up from a source table,rule by rule, until all rules are applied. The use of a swim lane analogis useful to visualize the rule execution hierarchy and overall dataprocessing approach. All processing that can be performed on data in adata set without requiring access to other data sets (that may also bebeing processed) is performed within the swim lane of the data set,thereby providing independent processing of each data set in its ownswim lane without affecting other data sets. Most of the time, a dataset will stay in its swim lane, but for certain rule types (e.g., linkand plugin) it may be necessary to transfer data from one lane toanother.

FIG. 8 depicts an embodiment of a measure factory data flow process forthree data sets (802, 804, 806). A data set 802 performs a calc factoryrule and a lookup factory rule before pausing processing to provide datato a link rule 808 operating in a script for data set 804. The data set802 rules processing continues once the lookup rule is complete. Ascript for processing the data set 802 resumes by processing a flag ruleand then executing a plugin rule 808 for accessing data from the datasets 804 and 806. The rule script of data set 802 finishes by executinga calc factory rule.

A script for processing rules for the data set 804 processes a flag rulefollowed by the link rule 808 through which it accesses summary datafrom data set 802 after completion of that data set's lookup rule.Processing may pause temporarily while the script for data set 806processes a link rule 810 that accesses data from data set 804. Notethat the data generated by the script for data set 804 may includesummary data from data set 802 at the time that the link rule 810 in thescript for data set 806 executes. In this way, the script for data set806 is configured to execute its link rule 810 only after data in dataset 804 includes the summary data generated from executing the link rule808. While a user definition of the link rule 810 may require thesummary, data generated by link rule 808 execution, the user does nothave to explicitly recite that link rule 808 be performed beforeexecuting link rule 810. A measure factory automated script processingfacility determines this dependency based on the link rule 810definition, an understanding of the data in each of the data sets, linkrule 808 definition and the like. This may, for example, be determinedfrom a data graph generated by the measure factory during generation ofthe scripts.

Methods and systems of a measure factory as described herein may includeexecution of a script of rules that may be automatically generated bythe measure factory. This automated rule execution may involve executinga large number of rules across a large number of data sets. Rules mayprocess data within a single data set or may require use of data frommultiple data sets. A rule processing set or algorithm may determine ageneral order or hierarchy of rule processing. One aspect of such analgorithm is the notion that only rules for which data is available canbe processed. This may be referred to herein as a rule being ready.Therefore, a rule is considered “ready” if it does not depend on a rulewhich hasn't yet been applied so that data required by rule is not yetavailable. The algorithm facilitates only applying a rule until it isready. The measure factory rule processing algorithm indicates that allready calc, flag, and lookup rules are to be processed in order. Theserules would not be executed because they would not be ready if theyrequire data output from any rule that has not yet executed. Therefore,an order of execution of calc, flag, and lookup rules are based onavailability of data within the given data set. After applying all readycalc, flag, and lookup rules, a measure factory rule processing facilitymay process ready link and plugin rules. Processing continues byprocessing more calc, flag, and lookup rules that are ready that havenot yet been executed. Execution of rules continue with this generalhierarchy until all rules are complete.

FIG. 9 depicts an exemplary flow of rule execution based on this measurefactory rules processing algorithm. All ready rules are executed acrossall data sets in an instance of measure factory rule processing so thatat any time rules that do not depend on unavailable data may beexecuted. This facilitates highly efficient use of computer resources,scalability of the number of data sets, rules, and measures. It alsofacilitates use of distributed processing architectures and the like.Rules processing may, for example be distributed across networkedprocessors so that data operations can be localized for data sets thatare stored locally with each networked processor.

In embodiments, a columnar database processing engine referred to inU.S. patent application Ser. No. 15/164,546 the entirety of which isincorporated herein by reference as a Spectre data processing engine maybe employed to perform one or more of the script executions. In general,the Spectre data processing engine operates on and generates cBasecompatible columnar databases, such as the data sets described and usedherein. Therefore, any reference to processing one or more data setswith a measure factory script may be performed by the Spectre dataprocessing methods and systems described herein and/or incorporatedherein by reference. Spectre provides specific benefits to a computersystem operating the Spectre data processing engine. One such benefit isimprovement of computer performance over prior art data processingengines due to the highly efficient computing technology that Spectreemploys. Spectre works directly with columnar data bases such as acBase, which may be the data set used by the measure factory. Featuresassociated with Spectre, such as a semantic knowledge plan that Spectrereferences and any other infrastructure on which Spectre is described asoperating and/or that Spectre may reference or access in associationwith processing data sets is also incorporated herein by reference inits entirety. In embodiments one or more of the automatically generatedmeasure factory scripts described herein may represent a Spectrecompatible semantic knowledge plan. Additionally, the highly efficientprocessing mechanisms utilized by Spectre including, for example, queryoptimization, machine code optimization, and execution may be used inany step of the measure factory script generation and execution asappropriate. Further as noted in the documents referenced herein, thedata sets, such as columnar data sets, described herein may bestructured and/or optimized and/or tailored for efficient processing bya Spectre-like data processing engine. These aspects of the Spectre dataprocessing engine are described here as examples of only some of thebenefits and features of applying the Spectre data processing engine tomeasure factory operations.

FIG. 10 depicts an exemplary measure factory script processing flow toproduce two cBase compatible data sets, a Charges data set and anAccounts data set. References to “build script” and “dive script” mayindicate types of Spectre-compatible scripts that may have syntax,structure, formatting, and the like that may benefit from the processingcapabilities and optimizations of the Spectre data processing engine.Reference(s) to “integrator script” may indicate a script that performsan integration process, such as integrating data from multiple data setsand optionally other data sources.

The individual user-defined or predefined factory rules may be combinedand/or individually converted, via an automated script generationprocess, into one or more Spectre-compatible scripts, such as a buildscript. The automated script generation process will label a script as“checkpoint” if it produces an intermediate version of a cBase.Likewise, an automatically generated script that produces a finalversion of a cBase file may be labelled as “final”. These labels, whileuseful for human inspection of scripts, may have no actionableattributes. On the other hand, during processing of a data set, anyscript that is labelled “checkpoint” will be processed by a Spectre-likedata processing engine before processing a script labelled “final” toensure proper integrity of the resulting data sets.

The Spectre technology may employ a combination of Spectre-compatiblescripts for executing some factory rules, such as a link rule. In anexample, of multi-script link rule processing, a dive-like script may beprocessed to summarize data from a matching data set (e.g., a data setthat may have multiple records for each unique record in an origin dataset). This dive-like script execution may be followed by execution of abuild-like Spectre compatible script that joins the summarized data fromthe matching data set into the corresponding records in the origin dataset.

The measure factory methods and systems may further improve computerperformance by selectively eliminating certain calc output data columnsfrom resulting cBase data sets. In general, a measure factory producedcBase data set will include a column for each rule processed during thefactory operation on the data set. Generally, a cBase data set producedby a measure factory execution will include the same number of records(e.g., rows) but more columns that the original source data set beforebeing processed by the measure factory. However, calc factory rules thatwere not used by any other rule type are removed from the final cBasefile; however, the continue to be saved and processed at query time.This reduces memory requirements for storing and processing resultingcBases. It also improves data query performance by a combination ofsmaller data bases and use of the Spectre data processing engine'shighly efficient columnar database processing capabilities. Performing acalc factory rule with a Spectre data processing engine at the time thedata is needed results in an improvement in overall computer performancerather than increasing the size of the resulting cBase to store the datafor such calc rules.

FIGS. 11-14, depict measure factory data set tables from an exemplaryuse of the measure factory methods and systems described herein. FIG. 11depicts a measure factory source data set for charges associated withtransactions of a business, such as a hospital. The charges data set ofFIG. 11 includes several source rules that are depicted as columnheadings in this columnar data set including Charge ID, Account ID,Posting Date, Revenue Code, and Charge. FIG. 12 depicts a measurefactory accounts data set. This data set includes rules for Account ID,Patient Type, Admit Date, and Discharge Date. FIG. 13 depicts anexemplary lookup rule reference file that may be used to add a RevenueDescription to another data set, such as the Charges data set of FIG.11. In the table of FIG. 13, Revenue Descriptions may be establishedwith an effectivity time-frame that may be defined by dates entered inthe_mf_start_date and_mf_end_date columns for each entry. FIG. 14depicts an exemplary flag rule table for determining which charges inthe Charges data set of FIG. 11 are Newborn Bed Charges. In thisexample, Revenue Code may be used as a flag key. Charges with revenuecode of 170 will be flagged as being a Newborn Bed Charge. Other revenuecodes (e.g., 110 and 450) do not get flagged as Newborn Bed Charges inthe Charges data set.

Measure factory methods and systems also include automaticallygenerating data processing scripts based on user configured source filesand factory rules. One potential approach for converting factory rulesinto scripts may include determining which data sets have the datarequired for executing each factory rule. Additionally, each factoryrule may be evaluated to determine what data it will produce in eachdata set. If a factory rule generates a type of data that is notavailable in any source data set, but that is required by anotherfactory rule, a dependency between the factory rules may beautomatically established. This may be accomplished by generating agraph of where data for each factory rule comes from, what data needs tobe populated in each data set, and what data needs to be present forgenerating final measures to be presented in a user interface, such as adashboard of business performance measures, and the like. Optimizationof all data paths throughout the execution of the measure factoryinstance is not necessary due to the highly efficient Spectre cBaseprocessing technology that is used to execute the generated scripts. Anygiven set of measure factory data sets may be processed dozens of times(perhaps 50 or more in some instances) through the execution ofautomatically generated measure factory scripts. The tradeoff ofsimplicity of user factory rule definition and script generation isworthwhile because of the efficiency of the Spectre data processingengine.

Configuring a measure factory may further include identifying the typesof data to be presented in a user interface, dashboard, guided page andthe like. Factory rules, source rules, dimensions of the data, and thelike may be identified. These aspects may be used as a guide togeneration of final cBase data sets that will be used by the userinterfaces, and the like.

Configuring a measure factory may further include identifying trends formeasures that may be positive or negative. By defining a trend aspositive, a dashboard for presenting measures corresponding to the trendmay include an indicator that reflects the trend as positive ornegative, rather than just as a numeric value. Referring again to FIG.1, dashboard 110 presents measures as graphics that can reflect a valueof a measure on a scale of measure values. Measure 112, for example, mayinclude a variety of ranges for measures that can depict whether themeasure represents a positive, neutral, or negative trend.

Referring to FIG. 15 that depicts a table that represents measureconfiguration and description information, various Inpatient measuresfor hospital operations are defined. Each measure may be associated witha portion of one or more measure factory dashboards as shown in thedashboards section 1502. Likewise, each measure may be associated with acategory 1504. For convenient reference, each measure may be given ameasure name 1506. A measure description 1508 may be included to providea business-centric description of each measure that can be turned into aset of factory rules during a measure factory configuration process.

Referring to FIG. 16 that depicts a measure factory executive dashboard1602 that provides information for a plurality of measures and withcomparisons over various time frames. In the dashboard embodiment ofFIG. 16, measures are presented in four categories 1604 with individualtrend visual indications 1606, including color coding, such as green forchanges over time that fit a preferred trend and red when a measure isfollowing a trend that is not preferred. Additionally, data for a numberof time frames 1608 and a visual indicator of the trend of the measureon a trend scale 1610. Measure configuration information and measurefactory output data is referenced when generating such a dashboard. Anindicator 1612 on the trend scale 1610 is automatically generated basedon this information.

Referring to FIG. 17 that depicts a current dashboard 1702 in a userinterface of a measure factory for measures based on recent timeperiods, a current period is presented in bar graph form. The exemplarydashboard of FIG. 17 shows nine measures for a single day time period(yesterday) 1704.

Referring to FIG. 18 that depicts an inpatient table 1802 of measures ina measure factory user interface, a scrollable table includes measuresgrouped by measure category 1504 for a range of time frames, month todate 1804, current month 1806, and year to date 1808.

Referring to FIG. 19 that depicts a multi-view dashboard 1902 in ameasure factory user interface, several measures for a selectedphysician are shown in table form 1904, line graph form 1906, and brokendown by diagnosis 1908.

Methods and systems for new and novel applications of a measure factorymay include automated detection of differences of business-specificperformance measures via automated computation of measures by applyingsource rules and factory rules to business-specific data. Thedifferences may be automatically detected by comparing measures tonormalized measures of the same type to identify departures from normal.The normalized measures may be established based on historical averages.They may also be established based on past time periods.

Automated detection of differences and suggestions for sources of datathat contribute to the detected differences may be accomplished througha combination of applying the source rules and factory rules asdescribed herein to generate measures that are automatically generatedfrom a user description of the measure, and using a data diving enginethat can process the underlying definition and automated scripts thatproduced the measure to form a structured definition of the measure thatidentifies the source data, intermediately generated data, and finalmeasures. By processing the elements that make up the measure factory,the data diving engine can pinpoint sources of measures through severaliterations of computation. These sources may be original source datafiles, content added to the source files during measure factoryexecution, and the like. With this knowledge of the elements and measurefactory operations that contribute to the production of measures ofbusiness performance, the data dive engine or the like can work throughelements to find candidates for explaining the differences in twomeasures, such as a measure output for two or more time periods (e.g.,current period and an earlier period).

As a data dive engine processes the actions that make up the measure ofbusiness performance it may arrange the underlying data sources so thatthose with a greater likelihood of contributing to the differencereceive a higher rating as representing a cause of the difference. Thismay be done through comparing comparable source data for the twomeasures. As an example, if a measure of a current period is detected assubstantively different from a prior period, each data value from thetwo time periods that contributes to the measure of the two periods maybe individually compared.

Merely comparing each pair of data elements could be inefficient and mayfurther result in many candidates. Techniques that target more likelysources of difference may be employed, such as traversing through thecomputations from the resulting measure backward through thecomputations, such as by following the script that generated the measurein reverse.

Another approach for detecting candidate sources that impact businessperformance as determined by comparing two measure factory measure whilereducing the computing resources required for this analysis may be tocompare values for these time differences while processing the values togenerate the final measure. Each difference above a threshold (e.g., apercent change and the like) could be flagged or otherwise logged as apotential candidate. Likewise, as each factory rule computation isperformed by the measure factory, the new rule value may be compared fora range of time periods. New rule values that exceed a threshold canlikewise be flagged.

Because a measure factory may produce many measures for many differenttime frames trending may be calculated as part of the measure factoryoperation. In an example, a factory rule may be configured to generate atrend indicator or quantitative value in data records for later timeframes based on data or similar indicators in data records for anearlier time frame. Another way to optimize analysis may be to comparetypical time frames, such as month over month, current month to the samemonth in the prior year, year to date versus same period prior year, andthe like.

When a difference between data used to calculate measures is deemed tobe likely to be a significant contributor to the end measuredifferences, it may be captured or marked for further processing. As anexample, a loop-type measure factory rule may be used to produce anextended description or other relevant details about the contributingelements. This information may be made available to a dashboard or otheroutput data structure to be presented in an electronic user interfacethat may facilitate human analysis of the differences.

A data analysis engine for automating detection of differences inmeasures of business performance may rely on measure factory technology,such as measures that are defined in a measure factory so thatrelationship among the measures (e.g., sums, ratios, and the like) maybe fully defined. Through this definition, all data sources and outputsare setup to allow automated calculation of any measure. By automating adata analysis process, it may be possible to access for analysis and/orpresenting in a user interface any underlying detail. The analysis maybe characterized by techniques that identify things of interest, such asby detecting large changes period-to-period or departures fromdetectable patterns and the like. The analysis methods may furtherautomatically identify contributors to the things of interest andpresent them with relevant context, such as “This is the highestcontributor, with a confidence factor of ‘x’. This is the next highestcontributor, with a confidence factor of ‘y’.” The result could bepresented in an executive dashboard that is configurable based on themeasures and detected differences so that the candidate sources withgreatest impact may be made most visible to the user. Alternatively, thedashboard could be configured so that information presented could bebased on the user's role (e.g., a financial person looking at thesources of differences versus a line manager looking at the sources ofthe differences).

Referring now to FIG. 20 that depicts a diagram of systems elements formeasure difference automated analysis. Data sources 2002 and 2004 may beinput to a measure factory 2006 and processed according to factory rulesand user configuration input that have been transformed by the methodsand systems described herein to a measure factory script 2008. Themeasure factory 2006 produces a columnar database cBase 2010 that mayinclude one or more rules (e.g., columns) that contain difference impactindicators for rows of data. As described herein, these indicators maybe generated by the measure factory while processing the source data toproduce measures. The user configuration information may be used toproduce a view 2012 of the cBase 2010 that results in a measure factorydashboard 2014. A measure difference automated analysis engine 2016 mayprocess the cBase 2010 along with the script 2008 and source data 2002and/or 2004 as described herein to produce an automated measuredifference analysis dashboard 2018 as described herein.

Embodiments of the present disclosure may include computer-automateddisclosure of at least one variance-impacting dimension among aplurality of dimensions of data that contribute to a measure of businessperformance of business activities that are represented at least in partby the data. As the relevant dimensions of data relevant to a businessincrease, the potential measures (representing combinations of multiplemeasures) increase exponentially. Accordingly, no human can possiblyevaluate all of the measures that are potentially relevant to abusiness. As a result of the impossibility of calculating or reviewingeven a small fraction of the possible measures, businesses typicallydefine a relatively small subset of common measures, which may or maynot reflect important events or trends that are relevant to thebusiness. However, potentially relevant measures can be identified by acomputer-automated process that is based on calculated statistics withrespect to individual dimensions or facts that are used to generatemeasures and/or the measures that are created by performing calculationson such measures. Such variances may include variances between definedtime periods, variances that are based on some normalization of ameasure (such as based on historical calculations of that measure), orthe like. In embodiments, detection of a variance may comprisedetermining data that contributes to the measure of business activity;comparing differences between at least one of calculations on determineddata, summaries of the determined data and elements of the determineddata for a plurality of varying (e.g., time-period-specific) measures;ranking at least a plurality of the differences (e.g., from largest tosmallest of the plurality of the differences); and presenting at leastone of descriptive data for a selected top number of ranked differencesand a selected top number of measures with respect to which differenceswere largest to a user in an electronic user interface of a computer. Inembodiments, the user interface may facilitate selecting one more of theplurality of varying (e.g., time-period-specific) measures, such as toobtain further information about the data and/or dimensions that relateto the measure. For example, a business, such as a health care facility,may track many types of information, such as admissions, re-admissions,beds occupied, diagnoses, insurance information, and the like. A measurelike occupancy might be reviewed and compared to occupancy for priortime periods, such as the prior week, the same week the preceding year,and the like, and trends might be observed by a human user. However,occupancy of a health care facility may result from a vast array ofunderlying factors, such as admissions, discharges, diagnoses, births,deaths, and the like, each of which may have a large number of causalfactors, such as diseases conditions, economic conditions, environmentalconditions, seasonal conditions, and the like. A given level ofoccupancy may also result in a wide range of financial outcomes for ahospital, as the extent of insurance coverage, the nature of theconditions treated, and other factors can be important. The financialoutcomes are similarly multi-dimensional. As a result, looking at asimple measure such as occupancy may provide very little insight intothe real business of the operation of a hospital. High occupancy mayresult in outstanding financial gains, or catastrophic losses, dependingon the patient mix. Stable occupancy may indicate a stable environment,or it may be a coincidental result of two opposing trends, such that achange in one of the trends might radically shift the business in afuture time period. While a human user cannot possibly evaluate all ofthe possible causes and effects, a measure factory may, using computerautomation, calculate a wide range of potential measures, such asmeasures involving the contributing elements that result in ahigher-level measure like occupancy. Once those measures are calculated,variances (such as over time), of the potentially contributing measurescan be used to surface ones that appear unusual, such as possiblyreflecting events that bear further analysis. For example, a largeincrease in the number of patients diagnosed with a serious infectiousdisease between time periods (e.g., compared week-to-week or for thesame week a year before), such as drug-resistant staph infection, wouldbe automatically detected by an automated measure factory generation andvariance calculation engine and surfaced to an analyst, even if othermeasures, such as occupancy rates, remain stable, such as because offavorable trends in other, less threatening diseases.

In embodiments, such methods and systems for automation of a measurefactory may include automatically ranking by degree of impact,business-relevant data dimensions and measures that contribute tobusiness measures (and thus may impact a change in businessperformance), including detecting such dimensions and measures byautomated comparison of a plurality of distinct time period-specificmeasures or dimensions of business performance. Such a process may beapplied to the measures generated by processing (such as for a measurefactory as disclosed herein) many-dimensional data representingpotentially causal factors relating to the activities of a business orother enterprise and/or representing outcomes of such causal factors. Inembodiments, processing with a measure factory may further includeapplying data processing scripts to data representing dimensionsrelating to business activities or measures, the scripts automaticallygenerated from a plurality of factory rules described as relationshipsof source rules and relationships of other factory rules; a plurality ofdata sets comprised of data representing the business activitiesarranged as a columnar array wherein each column is associated with adistinct source rule; and a factory rule execution hierarchy thatexecutes ready factory rules without dependency on other factory rulesbefore executing ready factory rules with dependency on other factoryrules. In embodiments, a “ready calc” factory rule is applied beforeother factory rules, so that measures that are ready for calculation canproceed, and a ready flag rule is applied after all ready calc ruleshave been applied to a given data set. Calculation of allready-for-calculation measures can proceed until all possiblecalculations are performed. Thus, measures may be serially generatedbased on readiness for calculation, such that they may be dynamicallypresented for analysis based on which ones, at a given time, appear toconstitute measures of interest, such as based on the variances (e.g.,period-over-period) noted above. In embodiments a hierarchy of factoryrule execution indicates an order of factory rule execution. Inembodiments, the hierarchy may be based in part on the nature of themeasures calculated, such as commencing execution on rules that involvemeasures that have been determined in recent time periods to includedimensions of interest (such as involving significant variances that mayreflect business-relevant events). In embodiments, the order of factoryrule execution may respond to a ready-for-calculation flag and maylookup such rules to execute before executing “ready link” rules, whichin turn may execute before “ready plugin” rules. In embodiments, factoryrules that apply only to data within a specific data set may be executedindependently of factory rules that apply to data within other datasets.

In embodiments, automated identification of dimensions and measures ofinterest, based on performing calculations on many dimensions thatpotentially contribute to measures of interest, and storing and rankingmeasures using time-period variances or other statistics may enablevarious business relevant analytic activities that were not previouslypossible. This may include projecting a change in a business performancemeasure based on analysis of differences over time of contributing dataelements that, when processed through a measure factory, are used tocalculate the business performance measure. For example, a businessmeasure that appears stable may be projected to change based ondiscovery of an event in a contributing measure that is likely to havelater influence on the higher-level measure. For example, if a hospitalhas had stable occupancy, but a measure of the diagnoses (diseaseconditions) of current patients indicates a high increase in thefraction of easily treatable conditions (when divided by allconditions), then an analyst may project a decrease in occupancy thatwould not have been found without the computer-automated calculation ofmany such measures. Such projections may also be performedautomatically, such as using change in underlying measures to identifymeasures for which projections should be performed, automaticallyperforming the projections, and automatically ranking, presenting, orhighlighting projections that vary significantly from normal patternsfor the applicable business measures.

Other uses of the analytic system may include suggesting a dimension, ameasure, and/or a business-relevant event or activity as a source of avariance between two business-centric performance measures of abusiness, where the measures that suggest the variance are automaticallygenerated by processing (such as with a measure factory, such as usingautomated processing rules noted herein) many-dimensional datarepresenting activities of the business. Similarly, the methods andsystems disclosed herein may enable suggesting an event that ischaracterized by data within a data set as a source of a variancebetween two business-centric performance measures of a business, wherethe measures are automatically generated by processing (such as with anautomated measure factory according to the various embodiments disclosedherein) data representing activities of the business.

Measures of interest, projections, events, dimensions, facts, summariesand the like that are identified by automated analysis (such astime-variance analysis) of automatically generated and calculatedmeasures (such as in a measure factory approach described throughoutthis disclosure), may be displayed in a dashboard, such as anoperational dashboard for a business or other enterprise thatautomatically presents one or more such results. This may include, forexample, contributors to notable variances of a measure of businessperformance (such as over time), where the contributors may bedetermined from sources of measures as defined by a set of factory rulesof a measure factory, the contributors may be tagged with avariance-impact confidence factor, and the dashboard may beautomatically configured based on a determined role of a user of thedashboard. The operational dashboard may automatically re-configure toshow the most relevant measure of interest, not only based on the roleof the user, but based on variances described above, such as in theunderlying data that is used to calculate one or more measures. Inembodiments, contributors to measures may be further automaticallyfiltered based on the determined role of the user, so that sources ofdata for contributors associated with the determined role of the userare represented in the dashboard (such as by descriptive informationabout role-specific business activities) that correspond to the sourcesof data for the filtered contributors. For example, a doctor may bepresented with measures, projections, or the like where contributingdata indicates high variances in data about disease conditions,diagnoses, patient outcomes, and the like, while a financial operatormay be presented with information about measures, projections, events,or the like that involve time-variances in contributing data aboutoccupancy rates, insurance, re-admissions, and the like.

The methods and systems described herein may be deployed in part or inwhole through a machine that executes computer software, program codes,and/or instructions on a processor. The processor may be part of aserver, client, network infrastructure, mobile computing platform,stationary computing platform, or other computing platform. A processormay be any kind of computational or processing device capable ofexecuting program instructions, codes, binary instructions and the like.The processor may be or include a signal processor, digital processor,embedded processor, microprocessor or any variant such as a co-processor(math co-processor, graphic co-processor, communication co-processor andthe like) and the like that may directly or indirectly facilitateexecution of program code or program instructions stored thereon. Inaddition, the processor may enable execution of multiple programs,threads, and codes. The threads may be executed simultaneously toenhance the performance of the processor and to facilitate simultaneousoperations of the application. By way of implementation, methods,program codes, program instructions and the like described herein may beimplemented in one or more thread. The thread may spawn other threadsthat may have assigned priorities associated with them; the processormay execute these threads based on priority or any other order based oninstructions provided in the program code. The processor may includememory that stores methods, codes, instructions and programs asdescribed herein and elsewhere. The processor may access a storagemedium through an interface that may store methods, codes, andinstructions as described herein and elsewhere. The storage mediumassociated with the processor for storing methods, programs, codes,program instructions or other type of instructions capable of beingexecuted by the computing or processing device may include but may notbe limited to one or more of a CD-ROM, DVD, memory, hard disk, flashdrive, RAM, ROM, cache and the like.

A processor may include one or more cores that may enhance speed andperformance of a multiprocessor. In embodiments, the process may be adual core processor, quad core processors, other chip-levelmultiprocessor and the like that combine two or more independent cores(called a die).

The methods and systems described herein may be deployed in part or inwhole through a machine that executes computer software on a server,client, firewall, gateway, hub, router, or other such computer and/ornetworking hardware. The software program may be associated with aserver that may include a file server, print server, domain server,internet server, intranet server and other variants such as secondaryserver, host server, distributed server and the like. The server mayinclude one or more of memories, processors, computer readabletransitory and/or non-transitory media, storage media, ports (physicaland virtual), communication devices, and interfaces capable of accessingother servers, clients, machines, and devices through a wired or awireless medium, and the like. The methods, programs or codes asdescribed herein and elsewhere may be executed by the server. Inaddition, other devices required for execution of methods as describedin this application may be considered as a part of the infrastructureassociated with the server.

The server may provide an interface to other devices including, withoutlimitation, clients, other servers, printers, database servers, printservers, file servers, communication servers, distributed servers andthe like. Additionally, this coupling and/or connection may facilitateremote execution of program across the network. The networking of someor all of these devices may facilitate parallel processing of a programor method at one or more location without deviating from the scope ofthe disclosure. In addition, all the devices attached to the serverthrough an interface may include at least one storage medium capable ofstoring methods, programs, code and/or instructions. A centralrepository may provide program instructions to be executed on differentdevices. In this implementation, the remote repository may act as astorage medium for program code, instructions, and programs.

The software program may be associated with a client that may include afile client, print client, domain client, internet client, intranetclient and other variants such as secondary client, host client,distributed client and the like. The client may include one or more ofmemories, processors, computer readable transitory and/or non-transitorymedia, storage media, ports (physical and virtual), communicationdevices, and interfaces capable of accessing other clients, servers,machines, and devices through a wired or a wireless medium, and thelike. The methods, programs or codes as described herein and elsewheremay be executed by the client. In addition, other devices required forexecution of methods as described in this application may be consideredas a part of the infrastructure associated with the client.

The client may provide an interface to other devices including, withoutlimitation, servers, other clients, printers, database servers, printservers, file servers, communication servers, distributed servers andthe like. Additionally, this coupling and/or connection may facilitateremote execution of program across the network. The networking of someor all of these devices may facilitate parallel processing of a programor method at one or more location without deviating from the scope ofthe disclosure. In addition, all the devices attached to the clientthrough an interface may include at least one storage medium capable ofstoring methods, programs, applications, code and/or instructions. Acentral repository may provide program instructions to be executed ondifferent devices. In this implementation, the remote repository may actas a storage medium for program code, instructions, and programs.

The methods and systems described herein may be deployed in part or inwhole through network infrastructures. The network infrastructure mayinclude elements such as computing devices, servers, routers, hubs,firewalls, clients, personal computers, communication devices, routingdevices and other active and passive devices, modules and/or componentsas known in the art. The computing and/or non-computing device(s)associated with the network infrastructure may include, apart from othercomponents, a storage medium such as flash memory, buffer, stack, RAM,ROM and the like. The processes, methods, program codes, instructionsdescribed herein and elsewhere may be executed by one or more of thenetwork infrastructural elements.

The methods, program codes, and instructions described herein andelsewhere may be implemented on a cellular network having multiplecells. The cellular network may either be frequency division multipleaccess (FDMA) network or code division multiple access (CDMA) network.The cellular network may include mobile devices, cell sites, basestations, repeaters, antennas, towers, and the like.

The methods, programs codes, and instructions described herein andelsewhere may be implemented on or through mobile devices. The mobiledevices may include navigation devices, cell phones, mobile phones,mobile personal digital assistants, laptops, palmtops, netbooks, pagers,electronic books readers, music players and the like. These devices mayinclude, apart from other components, a storage medium such as a flashmemory, buffer, RAM, ROM and one or more computing devices. Thecomputing devices associated with mobile devices may be enabled toexecute program codes, methods, and instructions stored thereon.Alternatively, the mobile devices may be configured to executeinstructions in collaboration with other devices. The mobile devices maycommunicate with base stations interfaced with servers and configured toexecute program codes. The mobile devices may communicate on a peer topeer network, mesh network, or other communications network. The programcode may be stored on the storage medium associated with the server andexecuted by a computing device embedded within the server. The basestation may include a computing device and a storage medium. The storagedevice may store program codes and instructions executed by thecomputing devices associated with the base station.

The computer software, program codes, and/or instructions may be storedand/or accessed on machine readable transitory and/or non-transitorymedia that may include: computer components, devices, and recordingmedia that retain digital data used for computing for some interval oftime; semiconductor storage known as random access memory (RAM); massstorage typically for more permanent storage, such as optical discs,forms of magnetic storage like hard disks, tapes, drums, cards and othertypes; processor registers, cache memory, volatile memory, non-volatilememory; optical storage such as CD, DVD; removable media such as flashmemory (e.g. USB sticks or keys), floppy disks, magnetic tape, papertape, punch cards, standalone RAM disks, Zip drives, removable massstorage, off-line, and the like; other computer memory such as dynamicmemory, static memory, read/write storage, mutable storage, read only,random access, sequential access, location addressable, fileaddressable, content addressable, network attached storage, storage areanetwork, bar codes, magnetic ink, and the like.

The methods and systems described herein may transform physical and/oror intangible items from one state to another. The methods and systemsdescribed herein may also transform data representing physical and/orintangible items from one state to another.

The elements described and depicted herein, including in flow charts andblock diagrams throughout the figures, imply logical boundaries betweenthe elements. However, according to software or hardware engineeringpractices, the depicted elements and the functions thereof may beimplemented on machines through computer executable transitory and/ornon-transitory media having a processor capable of executing programinstructions stored thereon as a monolithic software structure, asstandalone software modules, or as modules that employ externalroutines, code, services, and so forth, or any combination of these, andall such implementations may be within the scope of the presentdisclosure. Examples of such machines may include, but may not belimited to, personal digital assistants, laptops, personal computers,mobile phones, other handheld computing devices, medical equipment,wired or wireless communication devices, transducers, chips,calculators, satellites, tablet PCs, electronic books, gadgets,electronic devices, devices having artificial intelligence, computingdevices, networking equipment, servers, routers and the like.Furthermore, the elements depicted in the flow chart and block diagramsor any other logical component may be implemented on a machine capableof executing program instructions. Thus, while the foregoing drawingsand descriptions set forth functional aspects of the disclosed systems,no particular arrangement of software for implementing these functionalaspects should be inferred from these descriptions unless explicitlystated or otherwise clear from the context. Similarly, it will beappreciated that the various steps identified and described above may bevaried, and that the order of steps may be adapted to particularapplications of the techniques disclosed herein. All such variations andmodifications are intended to fall within the scope of this disclosure.As such, the depiction and/or description of an order for various stepsshould not be understood to require a particular order of execution forthose steps, unless required by a particular application, or explicitlystated or otherwise clear from the context.

The methods and/or processes described above, and steps thereof, may berealized in hardware, software or any combination of hardware andsoftware suitable for a particular application. The hardware may includea dedicated computing device or specific computing device or particularaspect or component of a specific computing device. The processes may berealized in one or more microprocessors, microcontrollers, embeddedmicrocontrollers, programmable digital signal processors or otherprogrammable device, along with internal and/or external memory. Theprocesses may also, or instead, be embodied in an application specificintegrated circuit, a programmable gate array, programmable array logic,or any other device or combination of devices that may be configured toprocess electronic signals. It will further be appreciated that one ormore of the processes may be realized as a computer executable codecapable of being executed on a machine-readable medium.

The computer executable code may be created using a structuredprogramming language such as C, an object oriented programming languagesuch as C++, or any other high-level or low-level programming language(including assembly languages, hardware description languages, anddatabase programming languages and technologies) that may be stored,compiled or interpreted to run on one of the above devices, as well asheterogeneous combinations of processors, processor architectures, orcombinations of different hardware and software, or any other machinecapable of executing program instructions.

Thus, in one aspect, each method described above and combinationsthereof may be embodied in computer executable code that, when executingon one or more computing devices, performs the steps thereof. In anotheraspect, the methods may be embodied in systems that perform the stepsthereof, and may be distributed across devices in a number of ways, orall of the functionality may be integrated into a dedicated, standalonedevice or other hardware. In another aspect, the means for performingthe steps associated with the processes described above may include anyof the hardware and/or software described above. All such permutationsand combinations are intended to fall within the scope of the presentdisclosure.

While the disclosure has been disclosed in connection with the preferredembodiments shown and described in detail, various modifications andimprovements thereon will become readily apparent to those skilled inthe art. Accordingly, the spirit and scope of the present disclosure isnot to be limited by the foregoing examples, but is to be understood inthe broadest sense allowable by law.

What is claimed is:
 1. A system for managing a business operationthrough application of insight into the operation, comprising: a measurefactory for generating analytical measures computed on operationalbusiness data that characterize the operation independently of thelocation of data, the measure factory comprising: a plurality of factoryrules that govern which operations are executed on available operationalbusiness data based on one or more conditions in the measure factory,the executing of operations taking into account source rules that areassociated with individual columns of a columnar array of the data andat least one of the plurality of factory rules; a factory rule executionhierarchy that specifies executing those factory rules that lackdependency on other factory rules before executing factory rules thathave dependency on other factory rules; and a factory rules processingfacility adapted to apply a portion of the factory rules to availabledata in a portion of the plurality of data sets based on the factoryrule execution hierarchy; wherein at least one reference to data in ananalytical measure maps to at least one of a type of the operationalbusiness data and a rule governing the operational business data thatcharacterize the operation.
 2. The system of claim 1, wherein availableoperational business data comprises data in a column of the columnararray that can be processed with a factory rule independent of the stateof completion of any other factory rule.
 3. The system of claim 1,wherein executing the operations is independent of a source of the datathat characterizes the business operation.
 4. The system of claim 1,wherein executing the operations is independent of a presence of datathat characterizes the operations being executed.
 5. The system of claim1, wherein the factory rules processing facility comprises a processorthat applies machine-specific code derived from the factory rules to theplurality of data sets by executing the machine-specific code.
 6. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the factory rules processing facility usesexecution threads to separately process groups of common calculationsgrouped across ready rules and groups of rule calculations that processcommon portions of at least one of the plurality of data sets.
 7. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the factory rule execution hierarchyindicates an order of factory rule execution.
 8. The system of claim 7,wherein the order of factory rule execution requires ready calc, flag,and lookup rules to execute before ready link rules which execute beforeready plugin rules.
 9. The system of claim 1, wherein the factory rulesare processed by the factory rules processing facility based on a datagraph derived from references to the plurality of data sets in thefactory rules.
 10. The system of claim 9, wherein the data graph isgenerated as a step in a process to process the factory rules.
 11. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the factory rule processing facility selectsat least one of a plurality of factory rules based on an effectivitydate associated with each of the plurality of factory rules and a targetdate.
 12. The system of claim 11, wherein the target date is the date onwhich the factory rules are processed.
 13. The system of claim 11,wherein the target date is an effectivity date based on the factory ruleexecution hierarchy.
 14. A method for generating, with a measuresfactory, analytical measures of operational business data thatcharacterize the business operation independently of the location ofdata, the operational business data configured in a columnar array ofdata, the method comprising: determining a plurality of factory ruleconditions in the measure factory; executing at least one source rulethat is associated with data in an individual column of the columnararray of data; accessing a factory rule execution hierarchy that ensuresfactory rules that lack dependency on other factory rules are executedbefore factory rules that have dependency on other factory rules;determining available data sources of the operational business databased factory rule execution dependency and execution status on data inindividual columns in the columnar array; applying, with a processor, aplurality of factory rules on available data based on at least one ofthe plurality of determined factory rule conditions and the factory ruleexecution hierarchy; and mapping references to data in the analyticalmeasures to at least one of the type of operational business data and arule that governs the operational business data that characterize theoperation.
 15. The method of claim 14, wherein the analytical measuresof data are measures of operating the business operation.
 16. The methodof claim 14, wherein applying the factory rules is independent of asource of the data that characterizes the business operation.
 17. Themethod of claim 14, wherein applying the factory rules is independent ofa presence of data that characterizes the operations being executed. 18.The method of claim 14, further comprising applying, with a processor,machine-specific code derived from the factory rules to the plurality ofdata sets by executing the machine-specific code.
 19. The method ofclaim 14, further comprising using execution threads to separatelyprocess grouped common calculations grouped across factory rules andgrouped rule calculations that process common portions of at least oneof the plurality of data sets.